The outdoors component of the program mentioned in the article will be led by Pip Cornall and supervised by institute director Grace Gawler and team advisor Dr Bruce Whelan.

“PIP Cornall is about to go where no man has gone before. He’s taking prostate cancer support to the outdoors. Whether it is fishing, camping or having a beer, he believes it is the perfect opportunity to support affected men in an environment which eliminates the stereotype of a therapist’s chair.

Rail freight giant QR National thinks there is merit to this world-first program designed to be piloted on the Gold Coast in early March and has donated $16,800.

The Prostate Mates program will be run through the Grace Gawler Institute, a local company with a long history of providing emotional support to cancer victims.

Mr Cornall joined the institute as a director after Ms Gawler, the institute founder, read an article he wrote while living in America on his work with men and boys in prison and taking them into the wilderness for therapy. He was also a physical education teacher on the Gold Coast in the mid 1970s.

Mr Cornall is hoping the Prostate Mates program will become a pioneer for prostate support groups across the world.
“Men would rather have a beer and go fishing so we thought, why not run with that trend,” he said.

“It’s taking therapy out of the office.” Mr Cornall said he planned to run the first session in March as either afternoon fishing on the Broadwater or camping on North Stradbroke Island.

“My role is to help men share their deepest fears in things like, if they have had treatment and are now impotent,” he said.
“When someone is no longer pretending to be strong it frees up their energy and helps the healing.”
Mr Cornall said 19,403 new cases of prostate cancer were diagnosed each year in Australia.”

My notes: The prostate diagnosies compare with about 14,234 cases of bowell cancer, 12,670 cases of breast cancer and melanoma of the skin (10,342 cases) in the same time frame. – Pip Cornall